Discontinued British Gas Alarms

NeoG

I bought a house a couple of years ago and has one of these British Gas contract alarms in it that have been discontinued from what I can find since 2013. 

Recently it started to bleep with trouble which I am presuming is the backup battery needing replacing. 

I have had a couple of alarm companies come out to look at replacing it but nobody seems to want to touch it. 

Is there nay sort of British Gas department to contact to get this thing removed or disconnected completely (that isn't going to cost me an arm and a leg)? As I don't even use it. 

victor2

NeoG said:

I bought a house a couple of years ago and has one of these British Gas contract alarms in it that have been discontinued from what I can find since 2013. 

Recently it started to bleep with trouble which I am presuming is the backup battery needing replacing. 

I have had a couple of alarm companies come out to look at replacing it but nobody seems to want to touch it. 

Is there nay sort of British Gas department to contact to get this thing removed or disconnected completely (that isn't going to cost me an arm and a leg)? As I don't even use it. 

Welcome to the forum!
If you can say what model the alarm is, you might get some help. If it is a failing backup battery, and you don't use the alarm anyway, can you not just remove the battery and disconnect the alarm from its mains supply?
It could have a battery in the bell box as well though!

NeoG

victor2 said:

NeoG said:

I bought a house a couple of years ago and has one of these British Gas contract alarms in it that have been discontinued from what I can find since 2013. 

Recently it started to bleep with trouble which I am presuming is the backup battery needing replacing. 

I have had a couple of alarm companies come out to look at replacing it but nobody seems to want to touch it. 

Is there nay sort of British Gas department to contact to get this thing removed or disconnected completely (that isn't going to cost me an arm and a leg)? As I don't even use it. 

Welcome to the forum!
If you can say what model the alarm is, you might get some help. If it is a failing backup battery, and you don't use the alarm anyway, can you not just remove the battery and disconnect the alarm from its mains supply?
It could have a battery in the bell box as well though!

From what I can see it's a DSC alarm. 

Just want to make sure because it's a mains connected alarm that if I remove or disconnect the battery backup it doesn't cause the alarm to go off contentiously. As I don't have any alarm code for this alarm. An the contact numbers on the alarm have not be used for some time. 

Jonboy_1984

Find a set of ear defenders, warn neighbours, remove mains supply and then cut every cable inside you can find with a pair of insulated wire cutters or apply delicate surgery with a lump hammer.

If it does have a battery you cannot get to, the worst case scenario will probably be 6-8 hours of noise, so do it early in the day. Hopefully less if battery is failing.

It will probably go off in either of the following scenarios:

Mains power is cut
Removed from wall - they normally have an anti-tamper switch (reset from the control panel).


We did pay an alarm company around £100 to remove one from a wall, and they just left it wailing to go flat...

NeoG

Jonboy_1984 said:

Find a set of ear defenders, warn neighbours, remove mains supply and then cut every cable inside you can find with a pair of insulated wire cutters or apply delicate surgery with a lump hammer.

If it does have a battery you cannot get to, the worst case scenario will probably be 6-8 hours of noise, so do it early in the day. Hopefully less if battery is failing.

It will probably go off in either of the following scenarios:

Mains power is cut
Removed from wall - they normally have an anti-tamper switch (reset from the control panel).


We did pay an alarm company around £100 to remove one from a wall, and they just left it wailing to go flat...

Maybe do this as a last resort

Don't want it really going off at all as has an internal and external siren that I'll need to find someway to cut as looks like they built this thing into the house when it was built. 

Plus hours of siren would drive me crazy while working from home. The low level beeping is already annoying me. 

DullGreyGuy

NeoG said:

Jonboy_1984 said:

Find a set of ear defenders, warn neighbours, remove mains supply and then cut every cable inside you can find with a pair of insulated wire cutters or apply delicate surgery with a lump hammer.

If it does have a battery you cannot get to, the worst case scenario will probably be 6-8 hours of noise, so do it early in the day. Hopefully less if battery is failing.

It will probably go off in either of the following scenarios:

Mains power is cut
Removed from wall - they normally have an anti-tamper switch (reset from the control panel).


We did pay an alarm company around £100 to remove one from a wall, and they just left it wailing to go flat...

Maybe do this as a last resort

Don't want it really going off at all as has an internal and external siren that I'll need to find someway to cut as looks like they built this thing into the house when it was built. 

Plus hours of siren would drive me crazy while working from home. The low level beeping is already annoying me. 

The fact its giving battery warnings probably means it wont go on too long. 

When we wanted rid of ours turned the power off and pulled the fuse to the alarm unit inside, the internal siren didnt sound without power and the outside one went for about 5 minutes before going off. Plan had been to get a ladder to but wires to the outside box but it turned itself off before I could get set up. 

Been like that for a few years now (other than removed the control panels and IR sensors in room corners as they were eyesores/in inconvenient places

ecraig

You need to be a bit inquisitive and look at how the battery is connected to the unit inside.
I don't want to be giving instructions on how to stop an alarm from sounding, but disconnect the internal unit first.
The tamper will go off and the external will siren for 5-8 mins. Whatever has been setup..
Then you need ear defenders when you climb the ladder to disconnect the siren.
Try and keep the wires neat you might want a wired alarm in the future. 

FFHillbilly

how long since the main battery was changed in the control panel? if it's longer than 5 years, it's probably flat so all you need to do is remove/disconnect the AC supply, if that control panel battery has been flat for a while the external sounder probably won't even be able to make a noise, it might for a few seconds though.
by design they are not supposed to sound for more than 20 minutes (nuisance regulations), so thats the longest it will ever sound for assuming it's all still healthy. realistically I'd say a few minutes of noise and that'll be it